Landmarks

Folks who lived in Birmingham between the mid 1930's and the 1980's may recall telling friends to "meet me under the Loveman's clock". For newcomers, A brief history lesson:

• Loveman's was a department store.
• It was in downtown Birmingham, which used to be kind of like The Summit...but with taller buildings and more of an edge.
• The store had a clock above it's main entrance, and the clock became a landmark to use for meeting up with friends.

• The store, like virtually all other retail establishments downtown, closed and stayed empty for a lot of years. Eventually part of the building's structure became what is now the McWayne Science Center.
• The clock was preserved, and is somewhere inside the center now.(see update below)

Loveman's wasn't the only place with a clock that became a meeting landmark...in Downtown Montgomery there was a freestanding clock outside the Klein & Sons jewelry store on Dexter Avenue. And people in the Capital City would say "Meet me under..."

• Like the Birmingham retailers, Klein & Sons closed their 1930's downtown store a long time ago, and eventually took their clock with them, in 1986, to a relatively suburban shopping stretch on Zelda Road.

• Now the clock in back on Dexter Avenue. The family donated the clock to the city, which has put it back exactly where it was originally.
• The story in the Montgomery Advertiser says they were able to use the original wiring to install the clock (which may say more about how little has beeen done to Dexter Avenue than anything), and the story quotes the Mayor as saying "This is the beginning of the revitalization effort of this street."
• The clock is pretty much surrounded by empty buildings...like a lot of Downtown Birmingham.
• There has been lots of great renovation work in the cities' downtowns, but absent from both is retail.
• It's nice that the Loveman's clock was saved for posterity, but it sure would be a lot nicer if there were an actual Loveman's store in Downtown Birmingham too (or something like it, since Loveman's was long ago swallowed up.)
• And the Klein & Son's clock is nice too. But an actual store would have been even nicer. In fact the store they moved to Zelda Road?  It's closing too. The family is moving out to Eastchase with the rest of the retail world. I guess it was just a matter of time.

[UPDATE: From the folks at The McWayne Science Center

The clock is still on the exterior of the building on the corner of 19th St. and 3rd Ave. North. It is not on display as an exhibit inside the museum. The image you posted was taken after the McWane Science Center renovation. Thanks for your interest. Please let me know if you have additional questions.
Erik Lizee
Director of Exhibit and Media Development]